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Charitable donations

I love a good wardrobe clear out. Every year, I’ll go through my clothes and sift through the items I simply don’t wear anymore, filling black bin liners of old garments ready for the charity shop.

Now I could be wrong, but I think an annual clear out is something that happens in most households. A good old clear out does wonders for the soul!

Well, it certainly was the case in the Warburton (not to be confused with the bread) family when Welsh rugby player Sam Warburton came back from the 2017 British and Irish Lions Tour earlier this month.

On Thursday (27th July), Sam tweeted a picture of himself outside a charity shop with two big bags of old rugby kit writing:

“It’s that time of year again! Pop down to @tenovuscancer Rhiwbina for my @lionsoffical and @cardiff_blues kit! Ready from 4pm today.”

When I first saw the tweet I thought how brilliant this was. It’s not often that you hear of sports players donating their kit to charity shops and it really does make sense to do it. I can’t imagine they’d be re-wearing it. This isn’t the first time that Sam has donated his kit to charity. He made the same gesture in 2015 after the Rugby World Cup.

After reading a little more into the donation, I found myself asking the very obvious question anybody working in PR would ask; was this donation generosity or a PR stunt?

I think I’d have to go with the latter.

Don’t get me wrong, the donation is certainly a sign of extreme generosity, but why does Warburton feel the need to tell everyone he’s doing it?

When I take my bin liners full of old clothes, toys, DVDs (you get the idea) to the charity shop, I certainly don’t post a picture of myself outside the shop telling everyone, “It’s that time of year again! Pop down to @Sue_Ryder for my 2016 wardrobe throwaways. Ready from 3pm today.”

I understand that Warburton needs to promote the donation to encourage fans to visit the charity shop and purchase his kit. He’s a patron of Tenovus so I’m sure will hope to do anything he can to help raise money for them, but I just can’t believe that there wasn’t something in it for him. If you search Sam Waburton kit donation on the internet, you’ll see article after article in the Telegraph, the Mirror, ITV News and plenty more shouting about how great Warburton’s donation is. He’s certainly come up smelling of roses after the donation...let’s hope his kit does too!

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